From treatment and containment to prevention and early interventionThe inaugural lecture of Professor Paul Burstow

Globally mental health conditions account for almost a quarter of the burden of disease yet in most health care systems attract significantly less resources to meet need. Mental health conditions are recognised as accelerants of healthcare resource utilisation and suboptimal outcomes in both morbidity and mortality, with life expectancy comparable to the life expectancy of the general population in the 1950s. Professor Paul Burstow, a former Minister of Mental Health in England is leading a policy commission for the University of Birmingham examining the best practice based evidence for a new paradigm for mental health that looks to the wider social determinants, adopts assets based approaches and early intervention across the life course.